This time while I am writing this I am sitting at over 35,000 feet and traveling about 600 mph, somewhere over the Pacific and about four hours out of San Francisco. I have finally wrapped up the eight weeks in Taiwan and am heading home for a month. I learned so much about my new job in that time, and about myself too. You can’t do this and not come home different. Hopefully its all in a good way. So what did I learn about modeling? Good question. I learned that after a two month absence that it really is a part of my life. It is the creative and artistic expression for me in my life. I missed that outlet and found that I need it. And that is a good thing.
So what does that look like? Well, I have a number of projects that have come to the front of my mind. As usual the problem will be that I can’t work on them all at once. But let’s talk about them and see what’s out there.
Ships. For some reason I have been really attracted to ships while I was gone. I visited a great website, ModelWarships.com, several times to read their forum, look at the gallery, and check out their resources. Boy, talk about rivet counters! That place was full of them. Guys that really care about the accuracy of their kits. I do too, but mostly I want to build them. So I am not going to be the guy re-doing the hull of my Hornet to give it a more accurate shape. But anyway... I found that I really want to build more ships. Over the years I have collected a reasonable ship stash. Both in 1/700 and 1/350. I even have the Trumpeter 1/200 Arizona.
Last year I started the Trumpeter 1/350 Hornet. I am detailing the full hangar deck and plan on putting it in a display on the Doolittle raid and include the US Navy blimp that was part of a resupply mission when they were three days out of San Francisco. So far I have the lower hull put together and most of the hangar doors cut open. I purchased a great set of plans for the ship. I am using the Gold Medal Models and Tom’s Model Works PE sets for it.
I was thinking though that before coming back to that I should tackle something a bit simpler. I have this habit of just diving into the most complex hairiest projects I can think of. It might be good to step back and practice building some ship models. I have built two to date. The older Tamiya Musashi in 1/700 and the Trumpeter 1/350 Lexington. I loved building the Lady Lex. I am still not quite done. The ship itself is done, but needs a complement of airplanes and rigging.
So what would I do? I have several 1/700 ships available. Maybe one of the Japanese ships from Pearl Harbor. I had started the Akagi at one point. Maybe I should finish that. I also could do one of the prewar US carriers. I have most of those in that scale. Not sure. I also want to do a resin ship. So maybe that. We’ll see. But there is a ship in my future.
For airplanes I always have a ton of projects to work on. The one that came to the top of my list was to build is the Trumpeter 1/48 C-47. I got that kit about three years ago and I need to do it. I would like to do a base displaying it in flight and disgorging paratroopers. I also have to finish my current projects, mainly my 1/32 Tamiya F-14 and Trumpeter Bf-109 in 1/24 scale.
For armor, I am not sure what my next deal is. Before I left I got out my 1/16 T-34 to have a look at. I saw a beautiful one done up at the Vancouver show and was excited to try my hand at it. I have really enjoyed my recent forays into armor. A welcome break from my typically steady diet of airplanes.
Wow. I’ve got a lot ahead. I’d better get home and get busy. I’ll close this up and get it ready to post when I get home. What projects are in your head... or on your work bench? Go ahead and leave a comment and tell us about them. Sometimes its as fun to talk about what you want to do as it is to do it. Talk to you soon.
Until next time... keep building.
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